There’s a global chip shortage that’s “limit-
ing production of everything from video
games to airplanes,” said Shira Ovide in
The New York Times. Automakers have
been complaining for weeks about having
to “slow or temporarily stop manufactur-
ing because they couldn’t get the required
computer chips” for entertainment consoles
or power steering. Though those plant
shutdowns have gotten the most attention,
problems stretch far beyond the auto in-
dustry. Last spring, chipmakers struggled to
keep pace with the “drastic demand surges”
in consumer electronics, which is why it
was “difficult or more expensive than you expected to buy a com-
puter for your child’s school.” The logjam moved on to cars this
winter, and now it’s starting to “whipsaw back into electronics.”“Designing chips is easier than ever,” said The Economist, but
“making them has never been harder.” A growing number of tech
firms, including Apple, Amazon, and Google, as well as a “gaggle
of startups,” have begun designing their own custom silicon to
“eke out performance gains” and challenge the established play-
ers like AMD, Nvidia, and Intel. But only three firms in the world
are able to make advanced processors: Intel, Samsung, and Tai-
wan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (and Intel said recently it
would begin to outsource some of its designs). The costs of their
precious high-tech “fabs,” as chip factories are known, are soar-ing: TSMC’s newest factory, for producing
next- generation chips, cost $19.5 billion.The bottleneck for automakers isn’t going
away, said Dan Gallagher in The Wall
Street Journal. “The harsh reality is that
chips for cars have to compete for manu-
facturing space with other products that
generate a much higher return.” About
70 percent of the car units are made by
TSMC, which was already operating at
capacity making components for phones
and gaming devices. Adding to the dif-
ficulties, many car chips are “still made on
200 mm wafers, which were phased out of the most advanced
chip- making processes more than a decade ago.”The White House has pledged to address the ongoing delays,
said Jenny Leonard in Bloomberg.com. President Biden signaled
last week he planned to sign an executive order to direct “a(^) government-wide supply-chain review” to better “identify choke
points.” We desperately need to improve our domestic semicon-
ductor manufacturing capability, said Brad Slingerlend and Jon
Bathgate in MarketWatch.com. This should serve as a wake-up
call. It matters not only “as the digitization of the global economy
accelerates” but also for national security. The idea that we’re
“relying on Taiwan for the production of critical chip components
for equipment such as the F-35 fighter is scary and untenable.”
Microchips: A worldwide crunch starts to bite
Re
ute
rs
A very expensive internet upgrade
AT&T finally provided high-speed internet
for a man who paid $10,000 for a newspa-
per ad asking for better service, said Joanna
Nelius in Gizmodo.com. North Hollywood,
Calif., resident Aaron Epstein took out “a
quarter-page ad in The Wall Street Journal last
week hoping to convince AT&T to upgrade
his slow-as-molasses DSL internet to fiber.”
In the ad, the 90-year-old Epstein wrote that
AT&T had been advertising downloads “up
to 100 MBS for other neighborhoods,” but
the “fastest now available to us” was only
3 MBS. Epstein’s neighbors apparently already
had AT&T Fiber, but he said the company
told him installation at his home would “cost
the company thousands and thousands of
dollars.” But two days after Epstein’s ad went
viral, AT&T “showed up” and laid the fiber.
Trump’s Twitter ban is permanent
Twitter said that ex- President Trump will re-
main banned from the platform even if he runs
again, said Haley Messenger in NBCNews
.com. “Twitter was the first social media plat-
form to take permanent action against Trump
following the Capitol riot on Jan. 6,” applying
a temporary suspension of his handle, @real
DonaldTrump. The company applied a full
ban shortly after reinstating Trump and deter-
mining his account risked “further incitement
of violence.” Though Trump was acquitted
in his second impeachment trial, Ned Segal,
Twitter’s chief financial officer, said the ban
will stay. “When you’re removed from the
platform, you’re removed from the platform,”
Segal said. Trump also remains suspended
from Facebook, although the company’s over-
sight board is reviewing his appeal.
New research on violent video games
Should parents let their kids into the violent
video games they are “begging to play”? asked
Julie Jargon in The Wall Street Journal. It’s a
perennial question, though the consensus from
numerous academic studies “appears to be
that neither cartoonish nor realistic violence in
video games translates to real-world violence.”
Researchers at Brigham Young University were
surprised to find that virtual violence didn’t
show long-term negative effects on empathy or
pro-social behaviors. That doesn’t mean there
is zero risk; “protective factors, such as having
good friends and loving parents,” are impor-
tant to reduce developing aggressive behavior.
Also some games let you control the level of
violence. Minecraft, for instance, has a “peace-
ful” level that cuts out hostile encounters.
Bytes: What’s new in tech
A company in Israel created an edi-
ble rib-eye steak using a 3-D printer,
said Laura Reiley in The Washington
Post. The technology, developed
by Aleph Farms in partnership
with the Technion Israel Institute of
Technology, prints living animal cells
that are “incubated on a plant-based
matrix,” allowing them to interact
and grow “to achieve the texture and
qualities of a real steak.” The com-
pany produced its first lab-grown
thin-cut steak in 2018, but enhance-
ments to the system have improved
the meat’s “sensory quality,” even
producing the “fatty marbling” of a
thick, high-grade rib-eye. The break-
through is big for the booming alt-
meat market; however, the Food and
Drug Administration has yet to set a
date when it might rule on approv-
ing lab-grown meat or poultry.
Innovation of the week
20 NEWS Technology
Few ‘fabs’ can handle the most advanced chips.